PHILADELPHIA (AP)  Two men sought in the kidnapping of a 7-year-old girl who escaped from her captors were arrested early Thursday, police said. James Burns, 29, and Edward Johnson, 23, were arrested around 5:30 a.m. in southwest Philadelphia, not far from where Erica Pratt was abducted Monday night while playing with her 5-year-old sister in front of their grandmother's rowhouse, police said.

Erica had escaped Tuesday after she gnawed her way through the duct tape that bound her, authorities had said.

Burns and Johnson were being treated for scrapes suffered when they tried to elude police in a foot chase, authorities said.

Officers had said the men live near some members of Erica's family and were known to the family. They said the men's names were provided by two witnesses to the kidnapping.

Police have said the girl's grandmother and primary caregiver, Barbara Pratt, received at least six calls from a man who threatened to kill the girl unless he received a $150,000 ransom.

Neighbors said there had been a rumor in the neighborhood that her family had recently come into a lot of money.

Whatever the motive, the plot was foiled with the girl's escape. Police said the "brave little girl" chewed through tape binding her hands, and broke out of the locked basement in an abandoned home where she had been held for almost 24 hours. The girl was back at home Wednesday, appearing no worse the wear.

The Pratts are far from wealthy, family and neighbors said. Their small blue-and-white brick rowhouse sits on a block peppered with abandoned buildings. Erica's mother, Serena Gillis, had her as a teen-ager and gave her up to be raised by her grandmother.

"There's not $150,000 in this whole neighborhood," said Mannwell Glenn, a family friend who has been acting as their spokesman.

Just about everyone on the street had heard stories the family might have come into money. Some said the girl's uncle had died, leaving behind a lucrative life insurance policy. Others said a relative who owned a record label had just signed a contract with Death Row Records, a major rap label.

One of the girl's uncles, Joseph Pratt Jr., was shot dead in his car in March. But family members said there was no life insurance.

Another uncle, Derrick Pratt, is the chief executive of an independent rap record label, CP Entertainment, and had briefly been in talks with Death Row — but no deal and no financial windfall was in the works, Glenn said.

Police said Erica had only a can of water during her ordeal, and the officers who found her gave her part of a chicken sandwich.

She was bound with duct tape around her arms, legs and eyes and left in the dirty basement of a building 10 miles from home. She was able to chew through the tape, break through the basement door and go up to the first floor. Unable to escape, she smashed a window and called out for help to some children playing in front of the abandoned house.

The children pulled Erica out of the window, and one of them rode their bike to alert the police.

"She's an amazing little girl," Chief Inspector Robert Davis said.

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